btw, those recipes ARE all hella cheap, provided you have the right gear.. that steak was ~18 bucks, but there is enough meat there to feed 4 people if you're all hungry and poor, or for like 10 steak sandwiches.. The decadence can easily be sliced into ~24 slices, and each one will seem huge, because it is so rich in texture and so flavorful.. the chocolate is the most expensive ingredient, i paid about 20 bucks for that whole cake. and of course the salsa is a bit pricey because of the tomatoes, but keep in mind, that's ~3lbs of salsa, which will give you bomb food with cheap chips for like a week.. that bowl went to a party with like 20 drunk people that all super chowed down, and we didn't even kill it..

If you cook at home, you can do shit on the cheap without eating crap like ramen

i just dont eat food... just drink a shit ton of water and take vitamins... and eat like a protein bar every now and then yet im still 200+ lb and i walk 1.5 miles every day???? its tough being 6'04"

Hungarian mushroom soup:

• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 cups chopped onions
• 1 pound fresh mushrooms, sliced
• 2 teaspoons dried dill weed
• 1 tablespoon paprika
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 2 cups chicken broth
• 1 cup milk
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• ground black pepper to taste
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
• 1/2 cup sour cream

Melt the butter in a large pot over medium heat. Saute the onions in the butter for 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms and saute for 5 more minutes. Stir in the dill, paprika, soy sauce and broth. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 15 minutes.
In a separate small bowl, whisk the milk and flour together. Pour this into the soup and stir well to blend. Cover and simmer for 15 more minutes, stirring occasionally.
Finally, stir in the salt, ground black pepper, lemon juice, parsley and sour cream. Mix together and allow to heat through over low heat, about 3 to 5 minutes. Do not boil, eat that shit hot.


Calorie restriction on the healthy and cheap side (it's super lazy, too):

• 28 oz can no salt added tomatoes (or two 14oz cans, easier to find)
• 16 oz bag frozen mixed vegetables (doesn't really matter -- I also usually get 32 oz bags and split them into two meals)
• 4 oz frozen leaf vegetables (collards, turnip, mustard, whatever)
• See below (200-250 calories of brown rice, yam, potato, whole wheat pasta, whatever)
• 1 tsp ground flax
• Whatever salt-free seasoning you want to use (Spike and Mrs Dash are good examples)

Throw the tomatoes into a pot (don't bother draining them), let them cook. Throw in your leaf greens, followed by your frozen vegetables. Start some instant rice or whatever (I use Success Rice from Wal-Mart, when my rice cooker isn't full of brown). Let it all cook, cover it so the vegetables steam a little if you want to lose some nutrition and make it more soggy. Throw the flax and seasoning in there when it's sufficiently hot, stir, mix in your chosen starch and dump some into a bowl. I also tend to put some olive oil in there to activate the lycopene in the tomatoes.

200-250 calories of starch boils down to:
1 1/2 medium potatoes
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pasta
1 1/4 cups brown rice

This will be about 600-650 calories per meal. If you eat it two to three times a day, it's around 1300-1950 calories total and super lazy.

This surpasses RDA/DRI recommendations for every nutrient. The only things on the low side are zinc, selenium and vitamin E.

It's a huge volume of food, for you fatties that want to lose weight and just stuff their faces all day. The recipe above yields one and a half servings. It's what I'd eat when I was weight training so many years ago (no, I'm not vegetarian, vegan or any of that other non-sense -- it just averaged out cheaper than other sources of protein/nutrition. My stomach doesn't tolerate whey isolate.)

Averaged break down from Cron-O-Meter of 2 meals a day:

General
Calories 1573
Protein 59.4 g / 108%
Carbs 329.1 g
Fiber 71.5 g
Fat 9.6 g

Without Flax / With Flax
Protein 13% / (13%)
Carbs 82% / (81%)
Fat 5% / (7%)

Vitamins
Vitamin A | 65584.7 IU / 2186%
Folate | 490.2 µg / 123%
B1 (Thiamine) | 2.0 mg / 167%
B2 (Riboflavin) | 2.3 mg / 180%
B3 (Niacin) | 29.2 mg / 182%
B5 (Pantothenic Acid)| 5.1 mg/ 103%
B6 (Pyridoxine) | 3.5 mg / 271%
Vitamin C | 235.8 mg / 262%
Vitamin E | 17.2 mg / 114%
Vitamin K | 1671.0 µg / 1393%

Minerals
Calcium | 1247.5 mg / 125%
Copper | 2.5 mg / 282%
Iron | 27.6 mg / 345%
Magnesium | 687.9 mg / 164%
Manganese | 11.4 mg / 494%
Phosphorus | 1297.4 mg / 185%
Potassium | 5294.0 mg / 113%
Selenium | 65.0 µg / 118%
Sodium | 609.6 mg 122%
Zinc | 10.8 mg / 98%

Lipids
Saturated | 1.7 g
Omega-3 | 0.6 g /(1.7)
Omega-6 | 3.2 g /(3.5)
Cholesterol | 0.0 mg

I THOUGHT YOU WERE A GNOME

<3 seeing a Hungarian recipe on this list.

Very good contributions so far. I'll toss in a heart clogger.

Bolognese al Forno
2 t garlic
1 lb fresh Pappardelle or Dried fettucine
Bolognese Meat mixture (recipe below)
4 c. cream

1.5 c. canned roma tomato puree (san marzano if possible)
2c. + parmesan cheese
White truffle oil to taste
salt
pepper
parsley

Bolognese Base

Take 1/4 lb each ground beef, veal, pork, bacon, and lamb
and cook in a large saucepan in very hot olive oil.
when browned a bit add 1.25 cups finely minced mirepoix (carrots celery and onions in a 1-1-2 ratio)
cook for about 7 minutes, lowering the heat to prevent burning. Season well. taste.
Add 3/4 bottle of red wine and .5 c tomato puree, mix well, and simmer until wine is mostly boiled off or incorporated into the meat (30 min). Should be a very little residual wine in the bottom of the pan. Cool.

Cook the pasta (in salty water) al dente and drain, drizzling with oil to prevent sticking. Reserve about a cup of the water.

Meanwhile, sweat the minced garlic in a knob of butter, in a giant saute pan (or scale down the ingredients to whatever size pan(s) are available)

Add cream and reduce a little over 1/2, boiling is ok, rolling boil not good.

Stir in bolognese meat and 1c tomato puree. as well as pasta with about 1/3 c. pasta water. combine well and bring to a simmer.

This is the tricky part. when the sauce is just starting to become nappe, turn the heat off, let cool a bit, and add butter in small knobs all over the pan, along with 1/2 the parmesan and the parsley. season and taste. then toss or briskly stir to let the butter relax and melt the cheese and thicken the sauce. dont boil it, heat gently if needed. loosen with pasta water if too thick.
pour into casserole or casseroles and top with more parm. a lot. then broil in broiler to brown. make sure broiler is hot. too long to brown cheese will break the sauce. when brown, drizzle with truffle oil to taste.
Its good.

that sounds like a french recipe

Lots of Eyetalian food is more like French food than American-Italian food. Though this recipe aint grandma's bolognese.

Well I know that traditional italians use cream in their bolognese sauce, but truffle oil sounds like a french thing

Where's the Bulghur Wheat? ;)